


Fluff

by cat_77



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types
Genre: Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-07
Updated: 2018-06-07
Packaged: 2019-05-19 04:43:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14866829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cat_77/pseuds/cat_77
Summary: Because, with everything else that’s going on, maybe a little fluff isn’t a bad thing.





	Fluff

**Author's Note:**

> Taking a break from the angst.
> 
> * * *

“It’s a dog, Fray,” Alec said, eyebrows raised. His tone was dry, with his usual sense of lack of amusement there, but he didn’t directly say no. Mind you, she didn’t directly ask, so there was that.

“It’s a puppy,” she corrected. She held the little ball of fur aloft to show its diminutive size. It had brindle coloring, with shades ranging from reddish brown to near black in swirls over its fluff. A tiny nose and ears that might have been pointed if they didn’t flop so much and a pink little tongue that darted out to lick a black button of a nose rounded off his cuteness. It was also about ninety percent pure fluff. “Most of the pound was destroyed by shax demons, but I found this little guy under the rubble. He was curled up with a litter of kittens.”

“Kittens?” Izzy asked in full delight. She turned to Clary and enthused, “I’ve always wanted one, but mom wouldn’t let us have any. She said there were too many risks involved, for us and for them.” Izzy was infamous for her obsession with the cats that frequented Magnus’ place, at times being reluctant to actually leave because of them. They seemed to love her right back, even if she couldn’t take them with her.

“Yeah, like demons eating them, or you being distracted in a fight because a demon was eating your kitten, or leaving them somewhere where a demon came in and ate them, or…,” Alec called over his shoulder as he continued to walk down the hallway.

Clary looked to Isabelle and then back to the squiggly ball of fur she still held. “He never actually said no,” she pointed out.

Isabelle grinned, all teeth. “And you never told me where the kittens were.”

The dog was summarily adopted by the entire Institute. Alec still pretended he didn’t see a thing, but also never moved the tiny bowls of food from the kitchen. Bowls, plural, because Izzy wasn’t the only one who grabbed a baby cat. Hers was nearly solid silver like the adamas of her bracelet with bright green eyes that found everything fascinating. Joyce’s was solid black like her runes. Theo’s was a bright white, and the Willowbrooke siblings each took one that were equal parts of the three colors, yet seemed to complement each other perfectly just like the three of them.

It was the first time that Clary came back injured that she decided the pup was always fated to belong with the Nephilim. She hobbled in on a twisted ankle, each step leaving droplets of blood on the bright floor from her injured thigh. Angela took one look at her, raised her eyebrows, and asked, “Where’s your stele?”

Clary barely had the chance to reply, “Somewhere under the west pier by now, I’m guessing,” before she was attacked by the little fluffball. He tried to knock up against her but, weighing less than a dozen pounds, was really not that successful. Instead, he charged until she took a step back, and then another, and then another, right up until a chair hit the back of her legs. She flopped down on top of it and reached for his ears the way he always loved but, to her confusion, he rushed back over to Angela and mouthed at the holster she wore on her thigh.

“Smart little guy, isn’t he,” Angela praised. She didn’t do anything as stupid as hand her stele to the dog, but she did waive it over Clary’s iratze before she pocketed it again. Instantly, Clary had a lapful of fur and she rewarded him with pets and kisses to his little nose.

“Ezekiel, no climbing!” Angela admonished. The dog, of course, did not respond.

“That’s not his name,” Clary chided her.

“You’re not calling him Kujo,” Jace sighed as he walked in. He pulled a little dog biscuit out of his pocket and bribed the thing with it and a gentle call of, “Here Monny.” He had decided the dog was a mongrel and called him appropriately. He used the puppy’s want for treats as an argument that he agreed with the name, though pretty much everyone had turned to that sooner or later.

That was the problem, really. Everyone had an idea what the pup should be called, but no one had the same idea. Technically he was Clary’s. Technically, she was called away enough that Ops as a whole took care of him as much as she did. Anyone would walk him, everyone over-fed him and gave him toys, and Alec was possibly the only one so far that had not just randomly bodily picked him up to cuddle while doing something else.

Yet.

It had only been two weeks and Clary had hopes.

Soon after, the pup had become the unofficial cuddler of the injured. Anyone who came back was treated to at least a lick and was expected to scratch behind his ears as payment for such. When Ellis was stuck in the Infirmary for four days, Clary found Shadowhunter and puppy curled up together in the uncomfortable bed at least twice a day. Possibly more, but she only had time to check that often. Denise had made him a tiny little jacket that had loops for a stele, but Alec put the kibosh on that almost immediately.

“The dog is already a security risk,” he argued. “Any vamp, wolf, warlock, or seelie could grab him and you would all go doe-eyed and stupid in an attempt to protect him.” Quieter, he muttered, “Same with the cats.” He was, however, not nearly brave enough to challenge his sister on her much beloved Argentum.

Oddly, the puppy did not chase the kittens at all. They would play together and nap together and drink from the same bowl more often than not. Clary caught Not-Kujo curled up with Izzy’s little Aggie in Jace’s room and decidedly did not coo. She may have snapped a picture with her phone and pulled out a sketchpad though.

It was when she walked in on Alec yelling, “No, absolutely not!” followed by a little ball of fluff darting out from his office that she got concerned. The yelling did not stop when the dog left though, so she peeked in to see if everything was okay.

“It’s just a collar,” Magnus argued. This was followed by, “Okay, and a kerchief but only because it was darling.”

She didn’t try to stifle her laughter at that, even when faced with the patented Lightwood Glare. It was just a collar, technically. Just a simple slip of leather that happened to be inscribed with enough runes to practically glow. She recognized at least three different types of protection ones, and wondered if Magnus had created more just because he could.

Alec made his same argument. Magnus nodded as if he was listening and considering everything he had to say. The dog that was in no way called “Snackums” because Janet thought he was too small to be called “Snookums” showed up at her door the next morning with a pretty collar and a darling kerchief. The tag that hung from it was made of adamas and shaped itself into a miniature stele when she held it in her hand.

She figured life would go on from there. Or at least she thought it would right up until she peeked over to Jace napping across the bottom of her bed and found her dog decidedly missing. He had been there only twenty minutes ago at the most, Jae absently petting him as he drifted off. He had said his head hurt, kind of, but in a weird way. Just a low grade headache that wasn’t worth the effort of doing anything actually healing-like when he had a break for the first time in four days and was going to take advantage of nap time. She wondered if he just wanted an excuse to laze around in her room while she drew even as she wondered where her dog had slunk off to. 

The answer was not what she had expected.

She followed the trail of discarded toys and water droplets from drink stops to the office of the Head of the Institute. Not-Puppenstien was decidedly banned from there in an effort not to give Alec a reason to snap and ban him from the building as a whole. The door was open though, just a fraction, just enough for a furry little thing to slip through. Inside it was dark, every light off and some sort of hazy spell over the windows to limit the ambient lighting from outside. 

Assuming that Alec was out doing whatever he did, she reached to flip the switch and search for her dog. The moment her hand hovered over the switch though, she heard a pitiful whine and quiet yelp from Not-Furmonger. It was followed by a hushed, “Shh,” from roughly the direction of the couch.

She activated her night vision rune instead and bit her lip at what she found. Alec Lightwood, the big bad Head of the Institute, was curled up on the couch, blanket pulled up to his ears, and face practically buried in the side of what was apparently a very patient dog. He patted him semi-awkwardly, but made no other attempts to move.

A sigh from beside her caught her attention, and she chided herself for not hearing the other approach. It was Magnus though, a literal warlock with magical silencing skills when he wanted them, so she figured she could be excused. “He has another migraine, doesn’t he?” he whispered.

“I didn’t think we could get those,” Clary balked. Everything healed so quickly as a Shadowhunter, either by nature or by rune. Such a mundane ailment taking one of their own down seemed odd, to say the least.

“Too much paperwork and Clave nonsense and too little food or sleep takes its toll on everyone, my dear,” he explained. He looked pointedly at the room’s huddled occupant and didn’t seem to care if he was noticed or not.

There was a grumble from the couch that sounded roughly like, “I used the stupid mini-stele. I’m just waiting for the iratze to kick in.”

Magnus stepped fully into the room at the sound of his boyfriend’s pathetic tone. He wandered over to the couch and ran his fingers though the tousled hair, the faintest hints of blue shining in the darkness. “That won’t be enough and you know it,” he chided. “By day three you need real food and a real nap, preferably at my place where I can block out the annoyances for you.”

“I blacked out the windows,” Alec protested around a yawn.

“I meant the Clave,” Magnus said with no shame.

Alec reluctantly pushed himself up, blanket now pooled around both him and the dog he still held. “Sin did his job, got me a stele even though my own was literally right over there,” he whined, as in actually whined in protest. It was petulant and childish and utterly adorable. She was starting to think that an entirely different side of the mighty Alexander Lightwood came into play when a certain someone was around. He seemed more human, for lack of a better word, which is probably precisely why he hated it.

“Cin?” Clary asked. She decided not to bring up the pout as that would only lead to not-good things. “As in Cinnamon?” Made sense, what with his coloring and it could be shortened much easier than the going lead name in the polls of Asclepius for the Greek God of Healing. Also, if it was Alec-approved, he’d have one less thing to complain about.

“If you want to think that, sure,” he smirked. It was almost back to his usual level of attitude.

“Behave,” Magnus admonished. He tugged at the blanket and the newly named Cin hopped down to trot over to Clary and beg for a treat. One materialized in her hand and, as soon as the blue faded away, she offered it to him. By then, Magnus had verified a portal wouldn’t be too much for the lingering pain and looked as though he was preparing to open one regardless.

She left them to it and headed back to see if Jace’s headache mysteriously disappeared as soon as his parabatai was healed. She was in no way surprised when Cin dutifully followed at her heels. He had a mission in life, after all. If he happened to stop to pee on Raj’s doorstep along the way, well, every mission had its price.


End file.
